Cleveland ISD school board approves soccer for next school year

Published 8:17 pm, Sunday, December 27, 2015

A new ball game is coming to Cleveland ISD as the school board recently approved for soccer to be a participating activity on the district’s UIL varsity acceptance form for the 2016-2017 school year.

Schools usually divide students between different sports for each gender. For the boys, they play football and baseball while the girls play volleyball and softball. Both boys and girls play basketball.

Internationally known as football, soccer is considered to be the world’s most popular sport. The game involves teams of 11 players attempting to get the ball into the opposing team’s goal, similar to hockey. Players are only allowed to use their feet, torsos or heads to strike the ball.

Although not as common among smaller schools, Superintendent Dr. Darrell Myers says the sport is more common among larger schools such as Cleveland ISD.

“A lot of schools our size have soccer,” said Myers. “It’s time for us to implement soccer.”

According to Myers, other local schools with soccer teams include Splendora ISD, New Caney ISD and Livingston ISD.

“Soccer is pretty big,” said Myers. “It’s growing rapidly.”

In other news, the board also approved the delivery method as related to the proceeds for the construction manager at risk regarding the Nov. 3 bond election.

This is not a selection of a construction manager at risk, which is expected to be resolved in the future. Myers explained what the construction manager, once selected, is going to be responsible for regarding the bond.

“We’ll be expanding and remodeling our middle school,” said Myers. “We’ve got safety issues that we’re going to address on all our campuses.”

Myers also says the bond will address adding more classrooms to their intermediate campus and remodel the bus barn.